Winner: Emerald Foods Ltd
Emerald Foods Ltd, a company that has experienced spectacular growth over the past three years, increasing export sales by 300 percent and successfully expanding into 20 new markets, is the winner of the award for Best Business Operating Internationally – $10 million to $50 million in the New Zealand International Business Awards 2009.
That growth has been driven by Shane Lamont, who joined Emerald as Managing Director in early 2006 and has turned the company around from heavy losses to profits.
Emerald is first and foremost a manufacturer of premium ice cream, sorbets and frozen yoghurt. Products are manufactured under proprietary brands, including New Zealand Natural and Killinchy Gold. It also co-manufactures ice cream for a number of international clients and owns the New Zealand Natural global ice cream parlour franchise, which now operates in 21 markets with over 650 outlets.
Mr Lamont has focused on the creation of profitable export volume. From just nine markets in 2006, Emerald now exports ice cream to 29 markets and has established new territories for the New Zealand Natural parlour brand, including the US, India, Saudi Arabia, and Fiji.
A key change he made on joining the business was to “get the right people on the bus”, changing more than 50 percent of the management team in the first few months and implementing a flat management structure. He also focused on sorting out the business operationally to be much more efficient, and shifted the business model to focus on export growth opportunities.
Mr Lamont says Emerald’s export strategy has been driven primarily by the identification of a huge, untapped international demand for the clean green image that is associated with food products from New Zealand.
Emerald initially targeted Japan in order to get quick, meaningful growth. The company then expanded into new markets, utilising regional offices in Australia and China. Exports now account for more than half of total revenue.
Operating in a vast array of international markets necessitates flexibility across the business, and it is the ability to react quickly and efficiently to customer requests that gives Emerald significant competitive advantage, says Mr Lamont.
“That flexibility has been extended into our manufacturing facility, where variations in formulation, run size and packaging format are planned and accommodated with minimal disruption. New Zealand Natural ice cream is, for instance, produced in nine different packaging types with separate formulations, including estrogen-free for India and Halal compliant for Saudi Arabia.”
Emerald is quick to respond to market trends, for example developing the no-added sugar Zilch ice cream brand to maximise opportunities for the growing ‘health conscious’ sector.
Leveraging its ice cream parlour franchise model has also seen Emerald open express parlours in resorts, expand the ‘store within store’ model, create cinema and cruise-ship partnerships, and achieve entry into several international supermarket channels.
“I was brought to Emerald to make the company successful and we wouldn’t have got to the position we have without pushing offshore,” says Mr Lamont. “We’ve now got business profitability and are building really good relationships globally.
“Personality and relationships have a lot to do with business success – otherwise we’d just send emails up to the market and say here’s the product and the price, do you want it? It doesn’t work that way. We are very interactive with key customers. We visit them regularly and encourage them to be down in our business. A lot of work goes into relationship building.”
Emerald’s vision is to continue its upward trend line both in profitability and market growth.
“We hope to add at least five countries a year for the foreseeable future. We also want to explore opportunities to leverage the New Zealand Natural Brand into other products, and continue our push internationally into supermarkets. Our ability to grow is pretty exciting.”
For further information
Shane Lamont, Managing Director, Emerald Foods Ltd, 09 272 7787, 027 229 8119, shanel@icecream.co.nz, www.icecream.co.nz
Ann Clifford, Corporate Communications Manager, New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, 04 816 8321, 027 283 3858, ann.clifford@nzte.govt.nz
